The Road to Recovery

Since last night there have been some ups and downs, but Kevin's making progress overall. Our good friend who's an ICU nurse assures me that these ups and downs are normal, but that Kevin’s blood oxygen level needs to improve somewhat in order for him to be safely and steadily on that road to recovery. (Thank you Scott so much for the reassuring phone call and wise words of advice!)

In addition to blood oxygen levels, doctors had some concerns about the heart rate last night, which required some medication, but the heart rate has stabilized within normal range since early hours this morning. (Thanks Rabbi for the wee hours phone call/prayer!) Since last night his blood oxygen level has fluctuated between 88 and 92 – it needs to stabilize in the mid 90s. Kevin’s doing his best to work his lungs -- two walks so far today and hourly workouts with the incentive spirometer (or as I used to call it – the breathing tube thingie). Scott explained that it’s much better for the recovery process if Kevin can improve the level on his own. If he has to rely on an oxygen mask, it will set him back. Thankfully, even though improvement is still needed, so for far he’s been able to bring the level up enough to avoid the mask.

In terms of how he's feeling, his throat is feeling much better, especially since starting on a liquid diet at lunch. Thankfully his incision area is not giving him much pain and he's not having to use too much of the pain meds. In terms of how he feels overall, that goes up and down with the blood oxygen level. Mostly he’d sleep constantly if he could and feels really wiped out when we wake him for exercise.

He’s really pushed himself today to try and get past what can be a vicious cycle of: not feeling well; so staying in bed and just sleeping; so not getting enough oxygen; so not feeling well… He took two walks down the hall, has worked hard on hourly breathing exercises, sat up in a chair to eat his lunch – popsicle, some Jell-O and tea -- took a chair “bath” and changed his gown. To use a military analogy, I think today was something of a “forced march” day.

Please do continue to keep him in prayer for:
- his blood oxygen level to increase and stabilize
- his heart rate to continue to be normal
- his digestive system to continue to “wake up” so he can progress to a soft diet tomorrow
- his spirits. This is the 4th time he’s had to endure this recovery process, and I can see he’s feeling so DONE with it all. It’s not fair, it sucks big time, but he can’t give in to the emotions that go along with that; he has to keep fighting. And that’s what he’s doing. I’m very proud of him and grateful.

Discharge update: Doctor thought this morning that Kevin still may be on track for release tomorrow, but if his blood oxygen level does not reach the mid-90s and stabilize, that won't happen. We’ll see. It could turn around quickly.

Support our troops: One more military analogy – nothing helps a soldier’s morale like a letter from home. Keep those emails and blog and facebook comments coming. Just one or two lines are all it takes to get a smile out of him.

I’m not sure what time tomorrow I’ll post again. If I have either GREAT news or significant concerns, I’ll post ASAP. Otherwise, assume that no news is good news.

Thanks for reading, caring and praying,

Roni